Despite this cursory report, the IT decided to editorialise on the matter, during which it argued that the cover-up of 'the church's most prolific child abuser' was driven by the same motiviation as 'Catholic church leaders...in Ireland;.ie 'protecting the institution no matter what.'
This remarkable ring fencing of Irish Catholic clerics alone as clerical abusers is another example of the IT's sectarian cverage of child abuse in Ireland. The newspaper's readers may be interested ti know that Church of Ireland (COI) lay worker Patrick O Brien - a most prolific, serial child abuser - pleaded guilty in 2016 to 51 sample counts of child abuse stretching over 33 yers to 2010.
As reported in The Phoenix in 2016, 'described in one report as the largest number of offences reportd against any individual in the history of the State, two days were set aside at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to hear details of teh assaults and it took over 30 minutest to simply read the charges.
'As far back as 1987, O Brien had been charged and subsequently convicted of abusing Kerry lawless, a 15 year old choir boy at St Patricks Cathedral, Dublin, where the lay worker was a volunteer. However, church authorities ignored his reported activities and he continued to work at the cathedral, going on to commit what one report calculated was over 1,000 offences in the following decades.'
IT readers might alse be interested to know that, while COI authoritiescovered up this serial abuse, the newspaper declined to publish court reports of O Briens prosecution and conviction. In the absence of any explanation, readers may be forced to conclude that their newspaper covered up the story to 'protect the institution (COI)' that has always enjoyed a warm, protective relationship with the IT.
There have been other abuse stories involving COI clerics - and subsequent cover-ups - that were either unreported or not scrutinised in anything like the same forensic manner in which the IT - quite rightly - covered abuse and cover-ups by Catholic clerics. These examples of one-sided coverage of child abuse by the IT have been reported on extensively in The Phoenix, as has the newspapers censorship of academic Niall Meehan, who has written at length on the abuse of children of in various Protestant-run homes. The writings and correspondence of the late Derek Leinster, a former resident of the COI-linked Bethany House, were also mostly unpublished by the IT.
Imagine the surprisewhen The Phoenix disclosed that the Walker family, which owned the Irish Times from 1959 - 1973, was closely linked to the Bethany Home, and its dubious adoption procedures.
It fell recently to another non-Irish Anglican entity - the protestant Church in Germany (EKD) - to explain the philosophic presumption that underpins the one-sided obsession with Catholic clericla child abuse.
The EKD was shocked by the bombshell report last january that exposed apalling sexual violence and cover-up by Protestant churches in germany. The report - covered in the IT - also noted that many EKD representatives had believed sexual violence against children was a uniquely Catholic phenomenenon.